The holidays are quickly approaching, and with the Christmas season comes lots of parties to attend and meals to host as we gather our family and friends together! With so much happening, getting organized is key to managing your time, and your finances too. Here's our list to help you with your planning!
1. Get your calendar updated!
With receiving lots of invites to holiday celebrations, sitting down and writing everything in your planner is the best way to get started. While you are marking the office parties and friend events on your calanedar, you will also want to set your dates for the meals and parties you will be hosting at your own home or a venue you are renting.
2. Count the many ways you will be giving!
Take a look at your noted events and determine if you will need to bring a hostess gift for the occasion. Will the party involve a Secret Santa gift giving session?
Decide if you will be providing party favours for your guests at the parties you are hosting. If you are hosting your family's Christmas gathering, are you buying a present for every guest, only the children attending, or is each family member being assigned one person to shop for so that everyone gets a present without breaking the bank!
3. Create your list for all those gifts!
Create your list with the event name and/or person's name. Once you have these all listed out, note beside the names what you would like to purchase for that person or for that event. Using a long pad of paper will work great for this. If you prefer to track your list digitally, you can find a mobile app or create a Word or Excel document on your computer.
4. Create your budget!
Once you can see how many gifts you need to purchase, you can start to narrow down what your budget will look like for gift giving this year. It will be quicker to do a guestimate at this point so that you can get an idea of what the total amount of money you will need to budget for. You will be able to see where you need to reduce or increase your spend per present and adjust your budget to what is going to work for you.
5. Group those gifts!
Now take a look at the categories of what gifts you are shopping for, and begin to group together what items you can purchase at what type of store. You can also look to adjust your other present ideas to better suit where you will be shopping.
For example, if you are seeing a lot of kitchenware items for family, you may want to adjust your party favours or Secret Santa gifts to be cookie cutters in order to maximize your shopping in one location - such as Heart of the Home!
6. Review and relist!
It is time to create a new list, this time with the stores that you are going to shop at, with the name of the events/people and the gifts that you will be purchasing at that store. Then list the next store, again with the events/people and presents listed underneath that you will be buying there.
7. Get out there and get shopping!
You are now all set to go out and do your Christmas shopping confident that you are organized and will have a present purchased for all your favourite people and for all the fun events and meals you will be enjoying this holiday season!
